Migrants in custody after boat lands at Boca Raton Inlet

Boat en route from Bahamas followed by U.S. Coast Guard, police say

February 21, 2013|By Brett Clarkson and Ed Komenda, Sun Sentinel

BOCA RATON – Eleven people were in the custody of U.S. Customs and Border Protection after a boat full of migrants landed at Boca Raton Inlet Thursday morning, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokeswoman said.

Elee Erice said the migrants were transferred to the U.S. Border Patrol station in Riviera Beach for processing after their arrival and subsequent arrests.

Erice said she could not comment further because of the ongoing investigation.

Nestor Yglesias, spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said in an email that Homeland Security Investigations — the investigative division of ICE — was investigating the landing.

"At this point we are not releasing any information since it is part of an ongoing investigation," Yglesias said.

Boca Raton police responded to a call from the United States Coast Guard at about 9:15 a.m. Thursday indicating that a Coast Guard vessel was following a boat into Boca Raton Inlet, police spokesman Mark Economou said.

The Boca-bound boat was traveling en route from the Bahamas, Economou said. The citizenship of the migrants wasn't clear.

"By the time we got the call from the Coast Guard, they were already in the inlet," Economou said.

Police arrived to find the boat abandoned.

After making landfall, the migrants split up into two waiting pickup trucks, Economou said. They were arrested shortly after.

At the time of the initial call, police set up a command post at 2909 S. Ocean Drive. Traffic on A1A was shut down and rerouted.

Police searched trunks of cars in hopes of finding the others who were on board the boat. Helicopters were searching from above and sheriff's boats were on the ocean.

According to U.S. Coast Guard figures, 90 foreign migrants had been intercepted at sea en route to the U.S. between Feb. 1 and 19. Those migrants include 38 Dominicans, 34 Cubans, 11 Mexicans and seven people from 'other' nations, according to the stats.